Feds pay $1 million for nature loss

San Antonio Express News
August 7, 2012
by Lynn Brezosky

BROWNSVILLE — Some four years after then-Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff waived dozens of environmental laws to expedite construction of the controversial border fence, the federal government has paid just short of $1 million for an 8.31-acre slice of land cutting across the northern edge of the Nature Conservancy's Southmost Preserve.

The preserve is home to one of only two large stands of native Mexican sabal palms remaining in the country.

Court documents show the government initially offered $114,000.

“The settlement represents an agreement on compensation for the land that was used for the border fence,” said Laura Huffman, state director for the Nature Conservancy. “That was never intended to and doesn't represent the conservation losses that we've experienced.”

On Monday $978,650 was deposited, just a few weeks before a jury trial to  determine the value of the land.

The settlement agreement was reached July 9.

Huffman said a jury decision likewise would have been based on what could be proven in terms of the value of the land and the structures atop it, with conservation losses remaining an unknown, if not priceless, factor.

The Conservancy purchased the 1,034-acre tract for $2.6 million in 1999, but figures its total acquisition cost to be about $3.1 million, not counting hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in equipment, stewardship, staff and outreach.

“The border fence has fragmented the preserve, from the standpoint that 800 acres of our preserve are now on the south side of the fence,” she said. “And fragmentation of heritage ranches and landscapes throughout Texas is one of the biggest issues and challenges that we face today.”
Some things still need to be worked out.

A gap in the fence, one of the last segments to be completed, has allowed for easy access for preserve caretaker Max Pons, his family, and workers including restoration technicians who care for the native plant seedlings in the preserve's nursery.

Customs and Border Protection plan eventually to install a gate.

“We do not know that they're planning,” Huffman said when asked about keys or access codes. “They've indicated they would be cooperative with us to the strike the right balance, making sure people who need to have access, have it, but not everybody.”

The house where Pons and his family have lived more than 10 years will be moved to the north side of the fence, meaning an end to the round-the-clock, on-site management he provided, particularly for the seed farm.

It will no longer be feasible for university students conducting research in one of the world's most ecologically diverse tracts to stay in lodging that at night will be locked in the no man's land.

Pons on Tuesday joked about being in a "gated community," but said life on the preserve so far has remained much the same in the year or so since the fence was completed.

The Border Patrol remains a constant presence on both sides of the fence.

“I'm not alone,” he said, watching two Border Patrol vehicles move along the dirt road leading to the preserve. As far as unauthorized immigrants? “I still don't see them like I see the animals.”

He said he communicates frequently with the Border Patrol, in part so they know when a new batch of footprints are from student biologists or bird-watchers and not unauthorized immigrants or drug smugglers.

While there are 107 acres of experimental farmland north of the fence, he said he was glad that the ponds, palm forests, and other native fauna — the entire habitat portion — remained intact.

Initial concepts for the fence would have placed it closer to the Rio Grande, a scenario that would have separated wildlife from their lifeblood.

“It's an extremely unique pristine area, made up of really interesting geological formations,” Pons said. “The hills that you see out there are referred to as ‘lomas,' Spanish for ‘active clay dunes.'” And it's part of 50,000 years of windblown and water-carried sediments piling up.

“One of the greatest feelings I have is when university classes come out and we go for a walk, and they look at me and say, ‘Wow, we didn't know this was here,'” he said.

The settlement is one of the last in a slew of condemnation lawsuits the government filed in 2008 to build the fence.

But even as it was reached, environmentalists have begun waging a fierce informational campaign regarding new segments planned to the west.

The segments have so far been stalled by concerns the fence's tooth-like structure could collect debris like a colander, creating flooding nightmares, said Scott Nicol of the group “No Border Wall.”

But the U.S. arm of the International Boundary and Water Commission, the binational commission charged with enforcing treaties sharing the Rio Grande, said recently it would not oppose the fencing, reversing its prior stance despite the Mexican arm's continued opposition.

“For years the U.S. half was telling Customs and Border Protection, ‘If you want to build this, you have to build something that can be removed, something that you can drag out of the floodplain within 72 hours of notice,'” he said. "Customs and Border Protection has said, ‘No, that's not feasible.' That should mean you just don't do it then.”

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/article/Four-years-later-government-pays-out-for-fencing-3770289.php

Government settles border fence land case in Texas

Associated Press / Houston Chronicle
August 6, 2012
by Christopher Sherman

McALLEN, Texas (AP) — The U.S. government paid almost $1 million Monday for part of a South Texas nature preserve taken for the border fence, ending nearly four years of litigation in one of the project's highest-profile condemnation cases.

The government deposited $978,650 with the court Monday, a month after notifying the judge it had reached a settlement with The Nature Conservancy and farmers who leased property there, according to court records. The settlement has not been finalized by the court.

The government took an 8.31-acre strip of land east of Brownsville for its fence, leaving most of the 1,000-acre property of sabal palms, oxbow lakes and citrus groves known as the Southmost Preserve in a no-man's land between the fence and the Rio Grande. The fence has already been constructed.

After going through a required mediation process recently, the two sides reached the agreement. If they had not, they would have had to argue the value of the condemnation in front of a jury.

Laura Huffman, The Nature Conservancy's state director, said the appraisals used in the mediation process included the value of the entire property and the buildings on it. The settlement reflected the estimated difference between the property's value without the fence and with it.

What the settlement doesn't include is the impact on the land's conservation value.

"This definitely fragments the land that's used by ocelots, for example," Huffman said. "And that's exactly the type of thing that you're trying to protect when you do this broad conservation is the habitat and the use of the habitat by the animals."

The organization is also moving the preserve's long-time manager, whose home was left between the fence and the river, off the property, Huffman said.

She said there were no immediate plans for the money, but a portion will be reimbursed to some who helped finance the land's original acquisition. Some of the land is leased to farmers and that will continue for now, she said.

The government has built about 650 miles of border barriers along the 1,954-mile U.S.-Mexico boundary.

The Rio Grande winds through South Texas, carving wide turns through rich farmland. The border fence was built in straight lines on or behind levees that protect against flooding, which left large tracts of land between fence and border.

In 2009, the government paid for about 300 mature sabal palms, a native species that once covered some 40,000 acres in South Texas and now exists only in pockets, to be moved and replanted elsewhere on the preserve and other properties to make way for the fence.

http://www.chron.com/news/article/Government-settles-border-fence-land-case-in-Texas-3766810.php

Texans on wrong side of border fence grow anxious

CBS News / Associated Press
February 11, 2012
by Christopher Sherman

(AP) BROWNSVILLE, Texas — Max Pons is already anticipating the anxiety he'll feel when the heavy steel gate shuts behind him, leaving his home isolated on a strip of land between America's border fence and the violence raging across the Rio Grande in Mexico.

For the past year, the manager of a sprawling preserve on the southern tip of Texas has been comforted by a gap in the rust-colored fence that gave him a quick escape route north in case of emergency. Now the U.S. government is installing the first gates to fill in this part of the fence along the Southwest border, and Pons admits he's pondering drastic scenarios.

"I think in my head I'm going to feel trapped," said Pons, who lives on the 1,000-acre property of sabal palms, oxbow lakes and citrus groves he manages for the Nature Conservancy's Southmost Preserve. "I need to have something that is much easier for me to have to ram to get through" if necessary.

Pons' concerns illustrate one of the complications in the government's 5-year-old effort to build a secure barrier along the border that would keep out illegal activity from Mexico without causing worse problems for the people living in the region.

In this lush area, the Rio Grande's wide floodplain precluded building the fence right on the border so it was set back more than a mile in places, running behind the levees. The result is a no-man's-land of hundreds of properties, and the people who work on them, on the wrong side of the divide.

The arrival of the gates will reveal whether the government's solution for this border fence problem will work. Can sliding panels in the fence controlled by passcodes allow isolated workers to cross when they need to while keeping intruders out?

Pons hopes the gates will open fast. "Because when is reinforcement going to show up?"

Some landowners also worry they'll become kidnapping targets for smugglers seeking passage through the 18-foot-tall metal fence.

Violence has surged in Tamaulipas, the Mexican state bordering this part of Texas, in the past two years. This week the State Department issued a new travel warning urging U.S. citizens again to avoid traveling there.

Residents in this rural area often see groups of illegal immigrants passing through or smugglers toting bundles. In October, the Border Patrol caught a high-ranking member of the Gulf cartel's Matamoros operations who had crossed about a half-hour upriver.

Gates will roll open on a metal track after a passcode is punched into a panel on or near the fence. Landowners would have permanent codes and could request temporary ones for visitors. Customs and Border Protection has begun testing its first two gates and plans to install 42 more in South Texas this year at a cost of $10 million.

For more than a year the tall steel bars and panels erected in segments on this stretch of the 1,954-mile U.S.-Mexico border created an effect that was more gap-toothed grin than impenetrable obstacle.

When the gates are closed, the Texans on the other side won't be completely isolated, agency officials say. Border Patrol agents will continue to work both sides of the fence and can assist property owners. Many of the areas also are monitored by cameras and sensors.

But farmers point out that there is a lot the agents can't stop. They point out dusty footprints scaling the columns and say illegal immigrants can climb the barrier in seconds flat.

"It's the biggest waste of taxpayer money," said Leonard Loop at his produce stand east of Brownsville, where his family farms and some relatives' homes are in an area between the fence and the river.

Loop's nephew Paul said he was not looking forward to the delay the gates will add to the countless trips he and his brother make between fields and the barn with their equipment. He also worried about becoming a target for smugglers eager to use the gates for large shipments. They are wide enough for farm equipment.

"Any drug dealer is going to know anyone on this side has a way out," Paul Loop said, while crews harvested cabbage in a nearby field.

Othal Brand Jr., chairman and general manager of the Hidalgo County Water Improvement District No. 3, said he welcomes the completion of the fence even though the district's headquarters is between the barrier and the river.

He said he's optimistic it will help deflect illegal crossings and other illegal activity as intended.

"It's like building a car and only putting three tires on it," he said. "Finish it. Get it done."

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501363_162-57375981/texans-on-wrong-side-of-border-fence-grow-anxious/

What is the impact of the border fence on Texas animals?

Texas Parks and Wildlife Magazine
August 2011
by Rob McCorkle


On a mild December day in the subtropical Rio Grande Valley, I’m following wildlife biologist Steve Benn along U.S. Highway 281 southeast of Weslaco toward the Hidalgo-Cameron County line. Winter crops like cabbage and onions poke from fecund Rio Grande delta soil along the narrow blacktop that heads south toward the river. An ink-black indigo snake — one of the Valley’s rare species — slithers across the road.

Pulling up behind Benn’s Texas Parks and Wildlife Department truck just north of the levee next to a large gap in the border wall, which rises 18 feet from the dirt, I spot two bobcats about 30 yards away on a bulldozed road that parallels the wall. Cut off to the south by the concrete and steel wall, the cats cast a furtive glance my way before wheeling and dashing north into the thin line of brush adjacent to the bare sugar cane fields just beyond. Had we not been parked next to the gap in this segment of the border wall on TPWD property, where federal government contractors will eventually install a gate, the cats might have slipped through and headed south toward the Rio Grande.

Though I’d read about the fence and seen photos, seeing the border wall with my own eyes bordered on the surreal. Broken segments of the 18-foot-tall, picket-like steel fencing zigzag across the tabletop-flat South Texas landscape, often beginning and ending in the middle of a field, visible at times from the highway, while at other times hidden beyond a distant tree line. While news coverage in the past few years has focused on the wall’s human-related purpose and impacts, little has been communicated about what effects the border fence might have on wildlife, land management practices and ecotourism in one of the state’s most impoverished regions.

* * *

The imposing fence inside the Anacua Unit of the Las Palomas Wildlife Management Area represents but one small part of Texas’ 110 miles of the 670 miles of congressionally mandated Southwest border fence hopscotching across the almost 2,000 miles of border from San Diego to Brownsville to deter drug smuggling and illegal crossings from Mexico into the United States.

In the lower Rio Grande Valley, all but a few of the 22 segments of the called-for 70 miles of pedestrian fencing (as opposed to vehicle fencing) already have been built under the direction of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Most of the shorter segments measure about a mile in length and were erected adjacent to international bridges or at traditionally heavily trafficked border crossings.

The half-mile-long Anacua Unit segment sits in the middle of 2.52 acres purchased by the federal government under condemnation proceedings initiated by the Department of Homeland Security under authority of the Secure Fence Act. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission opposed the land seizure, expressing concern that it would negatively affect wildlife habitat conservation efforts begun some 40 years ago in one of North America’s most important ecological regions, where nature tourism produces a $125 million-a-year economic impact. But federal authorities got the property and installed bollard-type fencing on a 60-foot-wide strip of land in the heart of the unit.

“When finished, and the gate’s put in, bobcats and many other terrestrial wildlife won’t be able to get through this fence here,” explains Benn, project leader for the 3,300-acre Las Palomas WMA, originally purchased by TPWD for white-winged dove nesting habitat with federal excise taxes on hunting equipment and white-winged dove stamp sales. The Anacua Unit is one of 18 units that make up the WMA, and three of them are adversely affected by the wall. “There’s only a 4-inch gap between the steel bars, and with the bars set into a 9-foot-deep concrete trench, animals won’t be able to burrow under it.”

The wildlife biologist worries that the border fence will only compound the Valley’s ongoing habitat fragmentation. He says the wall complicates the area’s wildlife management efforts and threatens indigenous rare species such as the ocelot, Texas tortoise, indigo snake and Texas horned lizard. Benn wonders, too, where animals trapped north of the wall, away from the river, will find drinking water.

Ironically, the wall has gone up in an area where TPWD, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and an army of conservation organizations have spent more than $150 million and several decades acquiring acreage and restoring native habitat in the Valley, where 95 percent of the Tamaulipan thornscrub and riparian woodlands has been eradicated. The result is a sprawling checkerboard of almost 200,000 acres under conservation protection in the Rio Grande delta, a government-protected wildlife corridor that facilitates animal migration and supports plant and animal diversity.

Conservationists fear the border wall will reverse much of that progress and hasten the demise of species such as the endangered ocelot, whose breeding U.S. population — confined to South Texas ranchland and the Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge — has dropped below 100.

* * *

In the field of wildlife biology, empirical evidence rules. But trying to discern just what kind of impact the still-unfinished border wall is having on wildlife proves to be a less-than-exact science. USFWS and TPWD biologists in 2008 struggled to establish baseline data before fence installation.

Biologists trapped and collared bobcats in several areas, including the Anacua tract, so they could track their movements as the wall went up. At TPWD’s Champion Unit in Hidalgo County, managed by the USFWS, biologists did a series of three-minute bird counts before fence construction began to see how bird populations might be affected by any habitat destruction, as well as the noise associated with building the fence and future U.S. Border Patrol operations. Although birds can fly over any barrier, conservationists note that destruction of riparian habitat for wall construction means many bird species would have less habitat in which to survive.

Much of the Valley’s wildlife exists in the USFWS South Texas Refuge Complex. The Santa Ana, Laguna Atascosa and Lower Rio Grande Valley national wildlife refuges include 100 tracts totaling 180,000 acres. Biologists and volunteers sampled wildlife and bird populations along wall segments being built inside the complex.

USFWS wildlife biologist Mitch Sternberg coordinates biological programs for the refuge complex. He oversaw pre- and post-construction wildlife track surveys conducted along roads at the base of four sections of the fence in Cameron County south and east of Brownsville in the Sabal Palm Audubon Sanctuary, the Southmost Preserve and Boscaje de la Palma.

Biologists found numerous animal tracks from coyotes, lizards, snakes and raccoons skirting the end of the fence segments, which typically abut roads used to access the river levee. In addition, biologists found that the wildlife crossings (8-by-11-inch “cat holes”) were being frequented primarily by raccoons. While the more than 300 passages incorporated into the various Valley fence segments at the request of USFWS can accommodate smaller terrestrial creatures, they are too small to allow passage of larger animals, such as coyotes, bobcats or tortoises.

In the summer of 2009, Sternberg conducted bobcat tracking surveys at several future fence construction sites. He set up infrared cameras near several wildlife corridors along natural drainages. Sternberg followed the movements of a bobcat mating pair and their kitten as construction got under way. When an adult female came into their territory, the bobcat pair killed her.

“In December, I saw both the male and female dead by Highway 281,” Stern recalls. “Their territory had been squeezed down to 400 square yards of agricultural fields and brush near the wall and highway. They were likely searching for more territory. There are 600 acres of brush south of the wall, but it was a mile to the gate opening and they didn’t find it.”

In Arizona, the border fence has been in place long enough for conservation scientists and others to track some of the consequences caused by fragmented habitat for specific wildlife populations. Aaron Flesch, senior research specialist with the University of Arizona’s School of Natural Resources and the Environment, documented some of the effects of habitat connectivity issues on desert bighorn sheep and ferruginous pygmy owls in an article published in Conservation Biology.

Of the diminutive owls that tend to fly only a few feet off the ground, Flesch wrote: “They tend to avoid large vegetation openings. And when they encounter large vegetation openings greater than 200 meters, they tend to turn around.” He concluded that large vegetation gaps coupled with tall fences “could limit trans-boundary movements” of the owls.

Flesch’s team also concluded that the “disruption of trans-boundary movement corridors by impermeable fencing would isolate some populations [of female bighorn sheep] on the Arizona side,” likely having a negative effect on the overall population living in the resulting fragmented Arizona habitat.

Flesch and his team suggested additional funding was needed to support research among governmental agencies, universities and other organizations to find the best ways to balance border security and the needs of wildlife species.

To that end, a team of University of Arizona researchers working with the U.S. Geological Survey in 2010 developed a protocol for monitoring the border wall’s potential effects on wildlife to help identify locations that need to have mitigation actions. It has been submitted to the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Department of Homeland Security and is still under review.

“What we’ve got now is anecdotal information and studies that look at one species or one section, but we really need a comprehensive analysis of the impacts over a large stretch of the area,” says Laura Lopez-Hoffman, assistant professor of the university’s School of Natural Resources.

Nancy Brown, public outreach specialist for the South Texas Refuge Complex, estimates the border wall has affected 60 to 75 percent of the complex’s land. Three-quarters of the federally owned acreage fronts the Rio Grande, which snakes for 275 miles through the Valley. In her Santa Ana NWR office is a map of the green swath of the river corridor marked with red squiggles that look like tiny worms, denoting the proposed segments of the wall to be built between Brownsville and Lake Falcon.

In Hidalgo County, contractors built roughly 20 miles of concrete wall — not along the river, but atop the meandering earthen levees that protect the southern part of the county from floodwaters. Here, no wildlife passages exist at the wall’s base.

The opposite end of the county is home to the Valley Nature Center. Overseeing the center’s operations in the heart of Weslaco is Martin Hagne, who moved to the Rio Grande Valley in 1979 and serves on the board of the Friends of Santa Ana NWR.

While the wall’s present impact on the Valley ecology and wildlife is just now becoming known, at least anecdotally, Hagne frets over the long-term effects of closing off wildlife corridors in so many different places, where the river sometimes takes wicked twists and turns.

Although the Valley Nature Center is far enough inland not to be impacted, the wall has affected operations at two of Cameron County’s most significant nature preserves bordering the Rio Grande.

Uncertainties surrounding the wall’s construction and access issues forced Audubon in May 2009 to close its Sabal Palm sanctuary, home to the nation’s last substantial stand of the subtropical sabal palm. The 527-acre nature preserve did reopen in January 2011 when a private group, the Gorgas Science Foundation of Brownsville, stepped forward to help fund and run the refuge.

A few miles downriver lies the 1,034-acre Southmost Preserve, another major native sabal palm sanctuary as well as a native plant nursery, organic citrus operation and critical native wildlife habitat for rare snakes, cats and other critters. The Nature Conservancy has filed suit contesting U.S. condemnation and seizure of eight acres that today hosts a 6,000-foot-long, 60-foot-wide strip of land bisected by the border fence. Its location cuts off the northernmost part of the preserve, isolating 900 acres between the wall and Rio Grande in what critics call a “no man’s land.” Preserve operators find themselves grappling with myriad land management challenges.

“My concern now is how do we manage the property, operate the nursery where we’re growing 80,000 seedlings under contract with the USFWS and keep the wetlands and resacas pumped full of water,” says John Herron, the Nature Conservancy’s director of conservation.

Herron says many people don’t realize that the fence doesn’t follow the river, that huge gaps exist between fence sections and that hundreds of acres end up stranded between the wall and river.

“The fence is exempted from environmental laws, so there hasn’t been any assessment of the environmental impact,” Herron says. “Who should pay for that? The USFWS hasn’t been given any money for that, nor have we. Here we are three years into it and there are lots of areas with no clarity.”

Fifth-generation South Texan Max Pons, who manages the preserve and lives on the property, hopes the wall’s presence doesn’t threaten the preserve’s wildlife that thrives amid the native Tamaulipan thornscrub and ancient stands of Sabal mexicana. The native palms once forested much of the Rio Grande Valley, but are now found only in deep South Texas and northern Mexico. Each palm, which can grow up to 40 feet tall, creates a micro-habitat of its own.

“You can have a population of southern yellow bats living under its leaves,” Pons explains, “and turkeys and other birds nesting and roosting. Invertebrates collect in leaf litter at the base, which attracts lizards and snakes such as the endangered indigo. Wood rats live in the trees and hop from one tree to the other.”

Pons credits the federal government, however, with working with him and other conservation agencies to try to mitigate some of the wall’s impact on wildlife. On a drive along a recently installed wall segment, he gets out to show me a hard-to-spot, notebook-paper-size opening that has been cut out at the bottom of the steel fencing to allow snakes and other small critters to pass through. In another concession to conservation organizations, he says federal contractors dug up several hundred sabal palms in the fence right-of-way for replanting at Southmost Preserve, Sabal Palm Audubon Sanctuary and Bosque de la Palma NWR.

Some representatives of the Valley’s lucrative nature tourism industry, a business fueled by world-class birding that draws enthusiasts hoping to add such local specialty birds as the green jay and chachalaca to their life lists, worry about the wall’s impact on local economies.

Nancy Millar, director of the McAllen Convention and Visitors Bureau, says news of the border wall has already resulted in one British birding company canceling future tours to the area. And, she says she gets plenty of questions about the impact of the fence when she attends travel shows in the U.S. and abroad.

For Keith Hackland, president of the Friends of the Wildlife Corridor and owner of the Alamo Inn and Outdoor Store in Alamo, concerns remain about what impact the border wall will have on prime birding spots in riparian forests farther upriver.

“The greatest fear I have is for the part of the wall being built from Rio Grande City to Falcon Dam in Starr County,” Hackland says, “because the plan is to place it along the river. Clearing the narrow strip of riparian forest on the banks would be an ecological disaster, eliminating the red-billed pigeon, Audubon’s oriole, Muscovy duck and all of the rare nesting birds.”

He contends that such habitat destruction in such an ecologically rich region blessed with more than 500 bird and 300 butterfly species will have a huge impact on wildlife,
conservation efforts and the economy.

“If nature tourists lose confidence in this area and can’t access the river forest,” Hackland says during my visit to his inn, “I’ll be looking for new use for this building. They are the ones who pay the bills and help make this enterprise work.”

http://www.tpwmagazine.com/archive/2011/aug/ed_3_borderwall/

Locked up: Sabal Palm Audubon Center remains closed

Brownsville Herald
May 1, 2010
by Laura Tillman

When you drive down the pot-hole flecked road leading to the Sabal Palm Audubon Center & Sanctuary, a field of silky green stalks of maturing corn sits to your left, the brown expanse of the U.S.-Mexico border fence stretches out in front.

At the end of the road there’s an opening in the rust-colored fence, which allows vehicles to motor over the levy to a vista of the lush wildlife sanctuary beyond. But when you arrive at the gate for the Sabal Palm Audubon Center itself, there is no moving ahead into the brush.

Instead a stop sign hangs here — and a lock.

Sabal Palm closed in May 2009 for the season with hopes of re-opening that October. But October came and went, and one year after the center initially closed it remains locked up. The center has been unable to secure the funding it needs to pay employees, thanks in part to a decline in donations after the recession began.

Owned by the Audubon Society, Sabal Palm is one of the last two remaining protected groves of sabal palm trees in the country. The other is next door at The Nature Conservancy, a private nature preserve generally closed to the public, which may also end its tenure in the Rio Grande Valley. In the case of The Nature Conservancy, the issue isn’t funding — its liability issues posed by the path of the U.S.-Mexico border fence, which places upwards of 90 percent of its property on the south side of the fence.

At the Sabal Palm Audubon Center, the fence has also raised concerns. Bob Bentson, the vice president of Audubon Texas, said that he didn’t know if the gap at the entrance of the preserve, for example, would be filled with a gate or just more fencing.

A spokeswoman for the Army Corps of Engineers told The Brownsville Herald that a gate would fill the spot.

"New hours of operation," reads a sign on the closed gate of Sabal Palms, hopefully. But then the next line, "the Sanctuary is currently closed," destroys that hope.

Bentson says the Audubon Society is optimistic that it will soon be able to secure funding to re-open the center, though he declined to specify where such money might come from.

"Unfortunately the economy hit us hard," Bentson said.

You can still drive to the entrance of Sabal Palm and, gazing over at the sanctuary, see kiskadees, mockingbirds, lizards, and the famous sabal palms themselves. The shaggy trees have not lost their rough tropical luster. But Bentson says that if and when the center re-opens, it will need some sprucing up.

"She doesn’t have on her Sunday best right now," he said.

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/audubon-111662-center-sabal.html

Final stretch of fence could close Southmost Preserve

Brownsville Herald
April 17, 2010
by Laura Tillman

Max Pons sees more wildlife in one day than most people see in months.

On Friday, Pons watched Black-bellied Whistling Ducks as they conducted reconnaissance to find the best place to build a nest.

He saw Altimira Orioles gathering food, walked along a stretch of sunflowers, Texas thistle, prickly poppies, and guinea grass, and kneeled down to pluck a sample of pepper grass as Indigo Buntings whipped through the air.

While many South Texans manage to get out to the area’s wildlife refuges a few days a month or year, Pons considers it a privilege to call The Nature Conservancy Southmost Preserve his workplace and his home for 18 years.

But after a court order granting possession of 8.31 acres of the land to the U.S. government for construction of 1.5 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border fence, Pons’ idyllic home may be no more. About 95 percent of the Nature Conservancy’s property will fall south of the fence, including one of the last two protected Sabal Palm groves in the United States.

As caretaker of the property, Pons’ home will fall behind the fence, along with the conservancy’s nursery.

“The border wall causes several unique damages and problems for the conservancy, including dangers to protected and rare species,” said Laura Huffman, the Texas director of The Nature Conservancy, an international nonprofit organization. “There are also security and access concerns for what will now be on the backside of the wall, including the Nature Conservancy operations and the home of the preserve manager and his family. A decision has not yet been made as to whether or not the Nature Conservancy can continue at this location.”

The stretch of border fence is among the last to be built in Brownsville, along with a half mile of fence in Lincoln Park, according to Army Corps of Engineers spokesperson Tara Dunlop. Engineers at the Nature Conservancy site said construction on the fence would start on Monday.

“We’re certainly disappointed,” said John Herron, Texas director of conservation for The Nature Conservancy. “We’re very concerned about how a fence will affect our ability to operate our preserve. I think we understand the concern about security and we certainly want to be supportive. But like any landowner we’re disappointed with the fact that the federal government has chosen to take the land.”

Pons takes care to talk with the Border Patrol agents, engineers, and construction staff who are now a regular presence in what remains his home and workplace. He chats with them about the wildlife, weather patterns, and the path of the fence.
“You’re just the messengers,” Pons said members of the Kiewit crew.

Pons walked along the segment of fence that has already been constructed near The Nature Conservancy property and came upon an old shed about 30 feet from the fence line.

“We were hoping they’d have to tear this shed down,” Pons said jokingly, pointing out the shed. “There’s a big bee population living in there they’d have to contend with.”

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/-111084--.html

Showdown: Landowners return to federal court to seek answers

Brownsville Herald
July 31, 2009
by Laura B. Martinez

The U.S. Attorney’s Office has agreed to amend its land condemnation motions against several private property owners in an effort to address questions posed by landowners near the controversial border fence.

The modifications include outlining what property the government plans to purchase or take and where access gates to private property would be located.

U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen said federal officials are only trying to construct a border fence as dictated to them by Congress; however, he added that the landowners should be able to sleep at night and know what the fence would look like and its location.

The issue was addressed Friday before Hanen during a status hearing, on pending lawsuits the government has filed against five groups of landowners.

"I don’t expect you to be singing kumbaya or having a camp fire together," Hanen told the attorneys representing the government and the landowners. However, Hanen added that he expected the attorneys to work together and address any flaws in the ordered amended motions.

Hanen in May suspended some of the border fence’s construction in Cameron County, after learning that landowners were concerned that access to their lands could be cut off and worried about the types of gating to be used.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Hu said the amendments should clarify what in the past had been described as problems. The government expects to take three to four weeks to amend the motions.

Attorney Kimberli Loessin, who represents landowners, said attorneys would work with the government attorneys to resolve problems.

Hanen also said he would "draft a charge" and provide a copy to attorneys on both sides should the land commendation lawsuits go to trial — that is, if the parties involved cannot reach a settlement.

Should the lawsuits go to trial, the first case is expected to be tried in January.

The landowners also want to know what land the government plans to pay for, including that in front and back of the fence. Some landowners believe land close to the fence would become worthless and hard to sell.

Much of the land near the fence is farmland.

The fence’s construction is part of the 2006 Secure Fence Act, which is part of the government’s comprehensive immigration reform and plans to secure the nation’s border. The Department of Homeland Security is overseeing the fence’s construction.

Hanen said amending the motions would be helpful to the landowners and would provide them with more specifics about the government’s plans.

"Once and for all we will all know" what the government plans to do, Hanen said.

The initial motions or declarations were said by some people to be "ambiguous" because they didn’t adequately address the issue of gates. For example, some landowners fear they and their homes might be locked behind the fence. They’re afraid they may not be able to get out from behind the fence when they want or duing an emergency.

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/attorney-100554-showdown-.html

If a Tree Falls in the Valley: The Sabal Palm and the Border Fence

The Nature Conservancy
June 22, 2009
by Clay Carrington

If a rare tree is leveled to make room for the border fence, will anyone care?

The moment the Secure Fence Act (H.R. 6061) was approved in 2006, the most important question associated with the construction of the United States-Mexico border fence ceased to be “why?” and became “where?” The fence — actually a series of intermittent freestanding barriers — is nearly complete, with most of the California, Arizona and New Mexico stages finished.

In West Texas, construction is well underway from the state line east to Fort Hancock, while on the opposite end of the state, building has begun on sections in the Rio Grande Valley. There, amid the resacas and thornscrub of South Texas, the finished fence will eventually trace the slow curves of the Rio Grande River.

More or less.

The border fence doesn’t strictly adhere to the national border — the Rio Grande. In reality, its path veers erratically inland — a straight line that disregards the natural curves and oxbows of an ageless river — creating huge swaths of the United States trapped in a “no man’s land” south of the fence and north of the border. The Nature Conservancy’s Lennox Foundation Southmost Preserve stands to be bisected by the fence, leaving nearly three-quarters of the preserve in this no man’s land.

The merits of Southmost Preserve are innumerable:

• Spanning 1,034 acres at the very tip of Texas, the preserve is home to a wealth of threatened and endangered species, including rare birds, frogs and tortoises.
• The land lies under the Central Flyway, one of four principal migratory bird routes in North America, and the preserve’s thick Tamaulipan thornscrub represents a prime wildlife corridor for free-roaming ocelots and jaguarundi.

For years Southmost Preserve has been a haven for scientists and birders enticed by land where, in a single day, dozens of rare animal species can be spotted.

But the real prize at Southmost — the bedrock of its unique habitat and the species that helped earn the preserve the moniker “Jewel of the Rio Grande” — is the rare sabal palm. Once found across much of the lower Gulf Coast, sabal palm forests have all but vanished under the plow. While some scattered trees can be found on private lands in the region, the significant remaining stands of these towering trees are located at Lennox Foundation Southmost Preserve, the Sabal Palm Audubon Center and the Lower Rio Grand Valley National Wildlife Refuge. All three of those conservation areas lie in the path of the border fence.

In order to save sabal palms that would otherwise be leveled by construction of the fence, the Conservancy is partnering with the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service and Audubon Texas in coordination with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to transplant palms to safe ground, one tree at a time.

The trees, which grow as tall as 65 feet and are up to 100 years old, are being uprooted and hauled to a number of spots, most within a mile of their original location, where they are then carefully replanted.

It’s a massive undertaking and a race against the clock. Each of the approximately 300 trees must be thoroughly trimmed and the root balls need to be unearthed intact to ensure survival. The project, which is already underway, is expected to last through the summer.

The security of our borders is of paramount importance. Since the creation of Southmost Preserve, the Conservancy has worked closely with the U.S. Border Patrol to allow ample access to the property.

Unfortunately, in an attempt to seize the preserve — or at least the narrow strip of land on which the fence would sit — the Department of Homeland Security has opted for litigation over collaboration. Southmost Preserve is now the subject of a condemnation lawsuit that, if successful, would allow construction of the fence and would require the government to pay for only the land on which the barrier sits, regardless of how much property winds up inaccessible, uninhabitable and outside the reach of conservation management.

Despite this harsh reality, the Conservancy, Texas Audubon and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service remain resolute, working throughout the intense heat of the South Texas summer to give hundreds of iconic, historic trees the best chance to survive for future generations of Texans.

And hopefully, if the project is a success, this scramble to protect the last remnants of a once-majestic forests will someday be viewed as the best possible conservation outcome salvaged from a very bad idea.

http://blog.nature.org/2009/06/border-fence-southmost-preserve-sabal-palm-nature-conservancy/

Protect The Texas Jaguarundi

Houston Press
June 19, 2009
by Chris Vogel

Ever heard of the jaguarundi? Neither have we.

Perhaps that's because this unique type of cat that lives along the Texas border with Mexico is endangered. Perhaps it's because nobody really cares. We're guessing it's a bit of both, but that doesn't mean every animal shouldn't have some human in their corner pulling for them.

WildEarth Guardian, a non-profit environmental organization, recently waged war in the form of a lawsuit in Houston federal court against Ken Salazar, Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, demanding that he put a conservation and survival plan together for the animal. After all, the organization argues, the cat has been listed as endangered since 1976, plenty of time to create such a plan as required under the Endangered Species Act.

Two types of the endangered species call south Texas their home, the Gulf Coast jaguarundi and the Sinaloan jaguarundi. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, they are larger than a domestic cat and have small ears, long, narrow bodies with short legs and flattened heads and tails. They generally look more like an otter or a weasel than a cat. They make their homes, according to the lawsuit, in the "dense thorny mesquite, cacti and cat claw thickets of southern Texas."

WildEarth argues that humans are making it tough on the jaguarundi these days.
Farmers are clearing away their habitat to make room for more vegetables and crops. Plus, says the organization, the border fence between the United States and Mexico is keeping the animal from crossing back and forth within its own natural environment, thus limiting their access to other jaguarundis to mate with.

According to the lawsuit, Salazar must create and implement a recovery plan for all endangered species unless he decides that such a plan will not promote the conservation of the species. So far, no such decision has been made. But neither has a plan. WildEarth is asking the judge to declare the fact that there is no plan so many years after the jaguarundi was declared endangered to be a violation of the Endangered Species Act and to make Salazar prepare and implement a plan.

Who knows, if it works, maybe all Texans will have heard about the jaguarundi.

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2009/06/endangered_species_border_wall.php

Conservationists say, ‘We'll take the trees, but no thanks to the border fence.'

Brownsville Herald
June 11, 2009
by Laura Tillman

On the outskirts of Brownsville, where subdivisions and strip malls give way to rust-tinted fields of sorghum, two environmental conservation non-profit organizations are welcoming what they call a "small positive in a sea of negative."

About 300 native sabal palm trees are being scooped out of the path of the border fence and transferred to the Nature Conservancy and Sabal Palm Audubon Center in Brownsville. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is moving the trees, the only palm species native to South Texas, off of what is now government-owned property at no cost to the nature centers.

Bob Benson, executive director of Audubon Texas, says his organization is concerned about the environmental impact of the border fence, but that the preservation of these trees is a "bright spot."

"Obviously it's making good out of a bad situation," Benson said.

But while Benson is glad to add trees to the Audubon Center, he has bigger worries.

Recently, several ongoing lawsuits between landowners and the federal government raised the question of whether the government could close planned access gates along the fence in the future. If the answer is yes, U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen has said that property owners could argue to a jury that the government would be taking not some but all of their property.

Since the Sabal Palm Audubon Center is slated to be entirely behind the border fence once it is built, the center must have a reliable access gate to remain open to the public.

"We've been acting on good faith that we would have these access gates," Benson said. "We're happy to get the trees, but our main concern is those gates. We have to have access to our property."

Because the sabal palm sanctuary is entirely behind the planned path of the border fence, the organization never had to sell land to the Department of Homeland Security to make way for the path of the border fence.

The ongoing border fence debate has depleted tourism to the sanctuary by about 25 percent, Benson said, and he's concerned once the structure goes up the public might not realize they can still visit. So far, the Sabal Palm Audubon Center has cut back its hours and has closed for the summer months.

The Nature Conservancy, which is close to the sabal palm sanctuary, is waiting for its day in court. State Director Laura Huffman says she is still hoping that the conservancy property could be used as testing ground for invisible fence technology.

"The good news is that these three organizations - the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Nature Conservancy, and the Audubon - are working together to save these trees," Huffman said. "The bad news is that if our property is compromised by a fence, then all the good we've accomplished will be lost."

More than 90 percent of the conservancy's property would be behind the fence if it's built.

On Thursday, mechanized tree spades dug snug six-foot inverted pyramids around the base of sabal palm trees and then removed them.

Then the machine dug out matching holes for the trees and slid them into their new homes. Finally, the corresponding holes were filled with the earth extracted from their new locations. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service completes about eight of these transfers daily.

Once the switch is made, the palms stand a high chance of survival, according to Maxwell Pons, the preserve manager at the Nature Conservancy.

Transplanting, he said, often doesn't work because there is too much wiggle room between the plant and surrounding soil. When the plant moves, fragile roots break, and the plant can't connect firmly to the soil. But with the accurate tree-spade method, the trees will integrate well into their new locations.

About 175 of the palms were destined for the 1,000-acre Nature Conservancy preserve. This preserve already has acres of shady sabal palm groves hugging the riverbank.

Pons, the steward of the refuge, has lived on the property for more than 20 years.

"I see more bobcats than immigrants," said Pons, who said he watched a bobcat run along the riverbank earlier that day.

Pons has seen jaguarundi, snakes, rare birds, and even the occasional ocelot on the rambling land that will soon be behind the border fence. The property is replete with history - both environmental and man made. The groves contain 45-foot sabal palms, some more than 100 years old. In one grove, a small shaded cemetery is home to graves more than 200 years old.

"You can't separate the natural history from the cultural history of the area," Huffman said. "When you stand at that cemetery you really get a historical sense of what that landscape really did look like. These ancient majestic trees are part of the beauty of South Texas."

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/trees-98955-border-conservationists.html

Rare palms moved for border fence

San Antonio Express-News
June 10, 2009
by Lynn Brezosky

BROWNSVILLE — Some 300 rare sabal palm trees are being extracted and relocated to save them from being killed for the government's border fence, the Nature Conservancy of Texas said Wednesday.

The trees, some a century old, are among the last remaining from a palm forest that once flourished along the Rio Grande but was felled for farmland and development.

Most of the remaining trees are now under the stewardship of the Nature Conservancy and Audubon Texas. The latter group maintains a 557-acre sanctuary along the fence path.

With funding and manpower supplied by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other federal agencies, the trees are being replanted to other properties owned by the Nature Conservancy and Audubon, including properties that will end up south of the fence.

“For the time being this will at least provide them with a fighting chance,” Nature Conservancy spokesman Paco Felici said. “The alternative is to cut them down.”

The federal government is funding the undertaking, which Nature Conservancy state director Laura Huffman said was a way to “create as much good out of the situation as possible.”

Litigation is pending concerning the fence's path through Conservancy and Audubon properties, Huffman said.

In the Conservancy's case, 700 of 1,200 acres will be cut off by the fence. Questions regarding access and security on the south side haven't been answered.

Huffman said she feared the on-site caretaker could no longer live in an area severed by the fence, and lack of oversight could open the preserve to tree poachers.

“If we cannot continue to protect the sabal palms and the habitat, then the conservation goals have in effect been compromised,” she said. “Owning the tracts and not being able to protect the species is a problem.”

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/47575847.html

Nature preserve: DHS failed to follow regulations

February 16, 2009
Brownsville Herald
by Kevin Seiff

A Brownsville nature preserve has responded to the government's attempt to condemn its land to build the border fence.

The Nature Conservancy - which owns and operates the Lennox Southmost Preserve - claims the U.S. Department of Homeland Security failed to follow federal regulations in attempting to acquire the organization's land.

In a motion filed on Feb. 6 to dismiss the government's land condemnation case, Nature Conservancy attorney Kimberli Deagen Loessin wrote, "the government has failed to meaningfully negotiate with landowners for the property interest sought." DHS offered $114,000 for just over eight acres of the organization's land.

Laura Huffman, the Conservancy's Texas state director, said in a December press release that the offer "doesn't begin to make up for our inability to manage the more than 700 acres of our preserve that lie between the proposed fence and the Mexican border. This land is, quite literally, irreplaceable."

The Nature Conservancy also claims that the government has never provided an accurate property description of the land to be condemned.

"Likewise," the lawsuit continues, "the government has not provided information regarding how access will work through the border fence gates." Such information, organization officials say, is particularly critical in the case, as a large portion of the preserve's 1,034-acre preserve could be left behind the barrier.

DHS Spokesman Michael Friel said he could not comment on the pending litigation.

The Nature Conservancy bought the land for Southmost Preserve in 1999 for $2.6 million. It now provides a habitat for thousands of native plants for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. The preserve is one of two major environmental refuges in Brownsville - along with the Sabal Palm Audubon Preserve - that is expected to be divided by the barrier.

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/preserve_94894___article.html/land_nature.html

Nature Conservancy Fights Planned Border Fence

National Public Radio
January 26, 2009
John Burnett

The Department of Homeland Security has completed 90 percent of its controversial 670-mile border fence — most of the sections from California to western Texas. But the border barrier is running into opposition from conservationists in far southern Texas.

From the road there, it's not obvious there's much down to protect. The great river delta that comprises the southern tip of Texas, known as the lower Rio Grande Valley, is a vast patchwork of citrus orchards and vegetable fields, shopping centers and car lots.

Yet, down on the banks of the muddy, torpid Rio Grande, "It's a jungle," says Sonia Najera of The Nature Conservancy. "It's incredible wildlife and vegetation and habitat."

The Nature Conservancy owns the Lennox Foundation Southmost Preserve — a thousand acres that include one of the largest remaining forests of native sabal palm. There, imperiled wildcats like the ocelot and jaguarundi still skulk through the underbrush. Birdwatchers come from around the world to check green jays, chachalacas and black-bellied whistling ducks off their life lists.

So last month, when the Department of Homeland Security announced its intention to erect an 18-foot tall, concrete-and-steel barrier for a mile through the preserve, the Nature Conservancy was not happy. Though the fence would be built on mainly nonforested land, conservationists worry it will sever the refuge.

"If the fence is constructed, it will trap three-quarters of the preserve between the fence and the river. That includes all of our facilities, includes the home of our preserve manager who lives there full-time," Najera says.

The conservancy has refused to accept the government's offer of $114,000 in compensation for the land under the fence. Now, Homeland Security has sued in federal court to force the sanctuary to let it build the barrier.

Other landowners, farmers and cities along the river also have said no to the fence. But a spokesperson with the federal agency says they've been able to work out a deal with most of the holdouts.

Dan Doty of the Border Patrol's Rio Grande sector says the new wall — though industrial in appearance — will be permeable and allow the passage of wildlife. He says people who live and work along the river will also be able to get through the wall by means of secure gates.

"The Rio Grande River is a beautiful resource. Our farmers depend on it, the communities here depend on it. Our goal is not to deny access to the river to anybody," Doty says.

The fence is part of border security measures mandated by Congress that include physical barriers, more agents and high-tech detection devices.

Though there's widespread skepticism among border residents as to whether the fence will do any good, the government reports that arrests of illegal crossers are down 19 percent since the fence went up — which it claims is significant, even accounting for the sour economy.

But conservationists remain concerned that a more secure border comes at a high price for habitat. The Nature Conservancy refuge is part of a 30-year effort to piece together public and private lands into a continuous wildlife corridor along the lower Rio Grande.

"Some estimates are that there's 1 percent of native natural land left along the river," says Betty Perez, a rancher and environmentalist in the area. "And the wall is fragmenting that."

The Nature Conservancy is hoping that the new Obama administration may consider alternatives to the final stages of the border barrier.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99882066

Environmentalists: $50M unable to mitigate border fence

Brownsville Herald
January 21, 2009

The federal government allocated $50 million last week to minimize the adverse environmental impact of the border fence - a measure that came just two weeks after the government sued one of Brownsville's largest nature preserves in order to begin work on the barrier.

Environmentalists in South Texas and beyond call the government's attempt at mitigation inadequate, pointing out that it might not aid fragile habitats outside of federal jurisdiction.

"Because we're not owned by the federal government, this money isn't for us," said Sonia Najera, South Texas Program Coordinator for The Nature Conservancy, which owns Brownsville's Lennox Southmost Preserve.

At the Southmost Preserve and the Sabal Palm Audubon Center - two preserves that will be bisected by the fence - officials see a simple solution: keep the barrier off environmentally sensitive land.

"The damage already done to the borderland's natural and cultural resources is dramatic," said Michael Degnan, the Sierra Club's associate Washington representative. "Border walls have caused devastating floods in communities and have bisected critical wildlife corridors."
But unlike wildlife corridors in Arizona, most of the Lower Rio Grande Valley is still unscathed by fencing.

Environmentalists hoped that once President Barack Obama took office, plans to build fencing along the Rio Grande Valley's wildlife corridor would be derailed.

But a spokesperson for Obama told TIME Magazine that the president supports the fence "as long as it is one part of a larger strategy on border security that includes more boots on the ground and increased use of technology."

If Obama chooses not to halt construction in the Rio Grande Valley, both Brownsville preserves will be situated in a no-man's land south of the fence. The Sabal Palm Audubon Center has announced that its doors will close after more than 37 years if the fence is constructed. For Southmost Preserve, it's a "wait- and-see" situation, officials said.

"I was surprised by (the Obama administration's statement)," said Najera. "Why are we spending so much money to construct the fence without trying other measures that would have less of an environmental impact?"

A portion of the newly allocated $50 million will likely be spent in the Valley to restore or recreate the habitats of native species, according to Rick Schultz, the U.S. Department of the Interior's national borderland coordinator.

But the mitigation efforts are aimed at compensating for the impacts to resources "managed, protected or under the jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior," according to federal documents. That stipulation leaves Brownsville's privately owned preserves with little consolation, Najera said.

"I wasn't happy about that," she said. "But the fence hasn't been constructed here yet. There's still hope in Cameron County."

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/fence_93928___article.html/valley_obama.html

Opponents of the Border Fence Look to Obama

Time
January 21, 2009

Federal bureaucrats call it the "border fence." The residents along the Texas-Mexico border say it's a wall echoing the Cold War. And south of the Rio Grande, Governor Humberto Moreira of the Mexican state of Coahuila has dubbed it a "wall of hate." But no matter what the controversial barrier being constructed between Mexico and the U.S. is called, the $1.6 billion, 670-mile-long first phase is close to completion as President Barack Obama enters office.

And for Obama, who voted for the border-fence bill back in 2006, the barrier may be best described as a big potential headache. Opponents are already appealing to him to halt construction and re-evaluate the project. But so far, the new Administration has given no indication that it is seriously considering doing so. While it has said it will make comprehensive immigration reform a priority, a spokesperson told TIME that Obama supports the fence "as long as it is one part of a larger strategy on border security that includes more boots on the ground and increased use of technology."

This, despite repeated pleas from border Democratic officeholders, residents with family and business ties on both sides of the river, and conservationists who fear their 30-year effort to string parcels of land into a necklace of treasured preserves for native fauna and flora will be destroyed as the acreage ends up in a riverside no-man's-land. On Wednesday, Obama's first day in office, advocates of immigration reform are holding a rally in Washington in which a multisectarian group of religious leaders will give the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Building a ritualistic cleansing to highlight the call to end workplace immigration raids and the construction of the border fence. (See pictures of the fence between the U.S. and Mexico.)

A map on the home page of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection website shows the daily progress of the border-fence construction — green for completed, yellow for under construction and red for planned. There is a line of green and yellow for the 693-mile border between Mexico and the states of California, Arizona and New Mexico. The colors turn to red on the far western and eastern edges of the 1,241-mile Mexico-Texas border. In between, there are just small patches of red, since only 110 miles of Texas border fence are planned in the initial stage.
But those 110 miles have proved the most problematic for the Department of Homeland Security, the agency charged with overseeing the project. While much of the U.S. land on the border west of Texas is held by the Federal Government or large landowners, the projects planned for Texas involve negotiating with a hodgepodge of cities, private landowners, tribal lands, farmers and conservationists.

"It's a sorry piece of work," says Mayor Chad Foster of Eagle Pass, Texas. Foster chairs the Texas Border Coalition, a group of cities, landowners, nonprofit conservation groups and Native American tribal communities that has sued the Federal Government to block construction in some areas. Plans in Eagle Pass, some 500 miles east of El Paso, call for the wall — now about 30% complete — to cross a municipal golf course. Initially, the city welcomed the idea of stadium lights on the bluff overlooking the city and the construction of a decorative fence, but when the plans were revealed, the wall-like barrier prompted community opposition. "One size doesn't fit all," insists Foster, whose community of some 50,000 people has close business ties to neighboring Piedras Negras, a city three times the size of its U.S. neighbor. He has pressed for a variety of alternative approaches, including the use of sensors to detect illegal movement and the eradication of "Carrizo cane" — an invasive, nonnative, tall river weed that provides easy hiding places along the riverbanks.

Meanwhile, south of the river, Moreira is planning a "green wall" of 400,000 tress along a 217-mile stretch of the border as a symbol of Mexico's protest. The green wall will provide sanctuary for the deer and other animals that normally cross to and fro between the two countries, Foster says. A confirmed supporter of President Bush, Foster believes that Bush, as governor, shared a widely held view in the region that Texas has a symbiotic relationship with Mexico. "I feel let down. I see the President as a fixer," Foster says. He believes "weighty issues" like Iraq distracted Bush, while national media voices like Fox News' Bill O'Reilly and CNN's Lou Dobbs have fanned national sentiment on the border fence. "I am optimistic that with border governors like Governor [Janet] Napolitano, Obama is getting people in the Cabinet who understand the border," Foster says. (See who's who in Barack Obama's White House.)

But for Texas conservationists, any shift may come too late, according to Laura Huffman, state director of the Texas Nature Conservancy. In the last week of 2008, the Department of Homeland Security sued the conservancy in a condemnation proceeding involving the Lennox Southmost Preserve, a 1,000-acre parcel that is just that — southmost — where the Rio Grande meets the Gulf of Mexico near Brownsville, Texas. The preserve, bought in 1999 by the conservancy for $2.5 million, is home to a rare grove of native sabal palms through which endangered ocelots and rare jaguarundi roam.

The Federal Government has condemned a narrow strip of land about 60 ft. wide and 6,000 ft. long running across the preserve and has offered to compensate the nonprofit with a $114,000 payment. The fence will effectively place 800 acres of the peninsula south of the wall, including equipment sheds, management offices and the preserve's on-site warden's home. Several small, organic farm plots leased to locals will also be in the no-man's-land. A similar fate is facing an adjoining sabal plam preserve owned by the Audubon Society. Huffman fears that the endangered palms, prized as garden totems, will be susceptible to poachers.

The preserve is just one of several linked along the river that attract visitors from all around the world, particularly bird watchers — last April, the sighting of a rare South American fork-tailed flycatcher, not seen in the area since 1879, attracted more than 2,000 visitors. "What's sad is, this threatens the effort, the partnership — public, private and nonprofits — that has worked together in this area," Huffman says. The wall may shatter a three-year, $100 million effort to restore habitats and preserve vital native species, she says.

The conservancy plans to pursue all legal remedies, including joining this month's appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court by the border coalition group to strike down Homeland Security's waiver of 32 federal, state, local and tribal environmental rules in order to construct the fence — a power granted by Congress when the agency was established in the aftermath of 9/11. The department does not comment on the 300-plus lawsuits making their way through the courts. In visits to the region, Homeland Security Chairman Michael Chertoff has said the numerous lawsuits have slowed progress, but 90% to 95% of the initial 670 miles will either be completed or have had ground broken as Bush leaves office.

As for opponents in Brownsville, on the eastern end of the Texas-Mexico border, they plan a symbolic retirement party for Chertoff this week complete with piñatas and mariachi music.
Even an 11th-hour announcement by the Bush Administration promising $50 million in mitigation projects to address environmental and cultural issues in sensitive areas, including tribal lands, has not impressed opponents and is likely to be reviewed by the incoming Administration.

"The wall will surely hurt American interests all across the Americas for a whole generation," wrote State Representative Elliott Shapleigh, a Democrat and a fifth-generation El Pasoan, in a recent Op-Ed. "Is it too much too soon to ask that this wall come down or is it the right thing to do at the right time in history? If not now, when? If not under President-elect Barack Obama, then who?"

Watch a video of Texans fighting the border fence.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1872650,00.html

DHS seeks to condemn nature preserve land

Associated Press / Austin American Statesman
December 29, 2008

McALLEN, Texas — The Department of Homeland Security has sued The Nature Conservancy to condemn land in a South Texas nature preserve for the border fence.

The conservancy's Lennox Foundation Southmost Preserve, which includes more than 1,000 acres along the Rio Grande near Brownsville, is home to a rare grove of native sabal palms, a South Texas native plant nursery for reforestation projects and habitat for the endangered ocelot and jaguarundi.

The government offered the conservancy $114,000 for a strip of land that would leave three-quarters of the preserve, including the property manager's home, in the no-man's land between the fence and Mexico, according to court records filed earlier this month.

The Nature Conservancy's preference is no fence and no compensation, but the offer failed to take into account the impact to the rest of preserve, Laura Huffman, The Nature Conservancy's state director, said Monday.

The organization paid more than $2.5 million in 1999 for the preserve and has invested considerable money in it since, Huffman said.

It would be a safety concern to have a property manager living south of the fence, Huffman said, and "if we can't steward the land properly ... it raises the question of whether or not it is a viable preserve."

In total, the 60-foot wide strip of land running 6,000 feet across the preserve is about eight acres.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which is trying to complete 670 miles of fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border, does not comment on pending litigation.

Even if the fence were situated in such a way that the conservancy's warehouse for its equipment and property manager's home were on the north side, the logistics of constantly moving farm equipment through still unspecified access gates would be daunting, Huffman said.
The Nature Conservancy leases swaths of the land for agriculture including organically grown citrus.

By starting the condemnation process, it at least gives the conservancy an opportunity to get its own appraisal of the property and make an argument for fair compensation, Huffman said. The conservancy would welcome a visit from U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen who has made site visits in the area for other condemnation cases, she said.

After one of Hanen's visits, the preserve's neighbor to the west worked out a compromise with Customs and Border Protection to build a concrete wall into the river side of the levee rather than building a fence, which would have affected buildings on the Old Nye Plantation. Huffman said such a wall would likely still create problems for the preserve.

The nearby Sabal Palm Audubon Center, which would be completely on the south side of the border fence, is still waiting for word on the fence.

Since the fence does not cross Audubon's 557 acres, the government has not had to sue for condemnation and has not told Audubon anything in months, said Anne Brown, vice president of National Audubon Society and executive director of Audubon Texas.
"We haven't heard a word," Brown said.

The border fence has faced its stiffest opposition in the Rio Grande Valley where it would cut through properties along the river that have been in families for generations, are critical habitat preserves or are part of large farming operations.

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/gen/ap/TX_Border_Fence.html